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Monday, April 2, 2012

V4:Chapter Five-Bank on It (cont.)

Volume Four

Chapter Five

Bank on It

Continued

The banker made an elaborate display of locking the main
door and pulling the curtains tight before he deigned to open the vault. Dodger
stepped into the strong room, all the way to the back, allowing his toe to come
to rest against the rear wall. Casting a glance about, left then right, he took
in as much detail as he could in the low light that filtered through the
doorway, though there wasn’t much to take in. The place was bare. Even the
shelves were gone. Dodger could just make out where the brackets were welded to
the lead walls.

Dodger backed out of the vault and said, “Were the shelves
gone too?”

“All of it was gone,” the banker said. “When I opened the
vault this morning, that is exactly how I found it. Empty.”

Which was another mark for the odd column. What kind of bank
robber stole shelves? Atop this oddity, another small matter niggled at
Dodger’s mind. “Will you gentlemen excuse me for a moment?”

“Why?” Biddlesworth asked. “Would you like a moment alone
with my vault so you can further defile her in privacy?”

Dodger did his best to repress a tacky smirk. “No, sir, I
just want to check on something. I’ll be right back.”

Before either man could argue, Dodger made his way out the
front door.

“Excuse me, sir?” a young woman asked. “Is there something
wrong with the bank? We’ve tried to ask the sheriff, but he won’t tell us
anything. Is there something wrong?”

“Yes,” Dodger said. “But we’re taking care of it. Don’t you
worry.”

“Is our money safe?” a man asked.

“I’m not at liberty to answer that, sir, because I’m afraid
I don’t work for the bank.”

“Then who do you work for?” another woman asked.

“Right now,” Dodger said with a tip of his hat, “I’m workin’
for you. So if you’ll allow me to get back to it, ladies and gentlemen.”

Leaving the crowd
atwitter with excitement, Dodger slipped around the side of the building. There
he walked, from one corner of the bank to the other, taking slow, deliberate
steps as his mind catalogued the requisite details.

“I figured as much,” he said under his breath to no one in
particular.

Feeling the pressure of eyes on him, Dodger whipped about to
catch sight of a silver-haired man staring out through the barred window of the
jailhouse next door. The fellow’s bloodshot eyes lay bordered by black circles
from either lack of sleep or excessive worry, probably both. Dodger smiled and
touched the brim of his hat. The stranger nodded and turned his sad eyes away
without saying a word. Dodger suspected this was the deputy, but it could’ve
just as well been the town drunk drying out in confinement. Of course, if what the banker had been spouting for the
last ten minutes was to be believed, the town drunk and the deputy were one and
the same.

Returning to the task at hand, Dodger joined the men inside
the bank once more. There, he took the same walk, from front door to the back
of the vault, just to be sure.

“Eleven,” Dodger announced. “Which leaves us two short.”

Biddlesworth grabbed the sheriff by the arm and said in a
low voice, “That man has lost his mind.”

“No,” Dodger said. “You’ve lost some length. Or rather
width. Your bank is thirteen paces from end to end outside, but inside it’s
only eleven. Taking into account the width of the walls and whatnot, two paces
is an awful wide space missing. Isn’t it?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Biddlesworth said. “This bank was
made to my specifications.”

“Well, perhaps not the exact sizes, but I’m sure it’s just
as big inside as it is outside.”

“How can you be sure?”

“Because I supervised the construction. That’s why. And
unlike you, I take my job seriously.”

While the banker jabbered on about his assured knowledge,
Dodger ran his hands along the back of the vault. Yes, it was sturdy, firm
under his wandering fingers … no … wait now, there was a soft space just at the
bottom. A square that gave way just a bit under his hands.

“I think I would know if there was something amiss,”
Biddlesworth said.

“Something like this?” Dodger asked, pressing against the
square, which gave way with a soft click and swung open.

“What on earth …” was all the banker had to say to that.

“Can I get a light?” Dodger asked.

The sheriff scurried over with a lit oil lamp. Dodger pushed
the lamp into the cubby, not sure what to expect to find, if anything at all.
The lamp slid inside with ease, and Dodger knelt to follow. Just as he entered
the hole, he hissed and pulled back. Dodger glanced down at his hands, to the
small shard of glass jutting out of his right palm. He picked the thing free
with a wince, and turned it over in his fingers. It sure looked like a piece of
glass, but what was it doing here?

More cautious this time, Dodger re-entered the hole,
sweeping his arm before him across the floor. And a good thing too, for he
cleared away a thin layer of the sharp shards, all waiting to cut his palms to
shreds like a crystalline booby trap. From what he could tell, the cubbyhole
ran a healthy couple of feet across, a little more than that in height, and a
few paces deep. It would’ve been more than big enough for a man to fit inside
if it had been empty. Which it was most certainly not. Dodger twisted in the
hole, half in and half out, to see what was taking up so much space.

Dodger jumped in surprise and banged his head on the strange
metal contraption looming in the darkness. Rubbing his now-tender noggin,
Dodger backed out of the hole to find Ched barging into the bank with a
stranger in tow. The same stranger from the jailhouse window.

“What is that man doing in here?” the banker asked.

“I let him in,” the stranger said.

Dodger could see now, from the brass star the man wore, that
he was indeed the deputy. The man was three times the age of his sheriff, and
if anything, the poor soul looked even more exhausted up close and personal. As
though the man hadn’t seen a decent night’s sleep in weeks, maybe even years.
Considering the recent events, Dodger could sympathize.

“Oh I see,” Biddlesworth said. “Sober enough now, are we?”

“That’s enough,” the sheriff warned.

The banker huffed and spun on his heel, shunning the four
men with all the snobbery available to his upturned nose.

“Becaush when the doc comesh into a town, folksh tend to run
him out the shame day. Ushusally there are pitchforksh and torchesh involved.
It’sh never pretty.”

“Tell him we need him,” Dodger said. “There is something
here he is going to want to see.”

Ched remained unimpressed.

“Tell him there is science to be done,” Dodger added.

“Shiensh?” Ched asked, rubbing his chin. “Why didn’t you
shay sho in the firsht plash? If there’sh anything that will shtoke a fire
under that mansh behind fashter then an ash-high flame, itsh the idea that he
can shtrut his shtuff.” Ched tipped his hat to the men. “Shee ya in a few.”

“Quick as you can,” Dodger said to Ched’s back. Turning to
the lawmen, Dodger clapped his hands in a very Dittmeyer-like fashion. “Sheriff
Stanley, Deputy Duncan, I’m going to need your help.”

“Help with what?” the sheriff asked.

“Help with hauling whatever contraption is hiding in the
bank walls out here so we can all get a good look at it.”